{I took my mini sabbatical off during the week of 9/17 but instead of my normal sabbatical week report, I have a more urgent news for you…}

Hey friend,

I opened up my first Etsy shop in December 2010.

I’d posted a picture of my crocheted fingerless gloves on Facebook (can’t believe FB has been out there for so long…) and a couple of friends said “you can sell that!”

I didn’t know what Etsy was and it was hard to imagine if anyone would want to pay for what I made.

But I said “why not?”

So I opened up a shop called “TeAmi Works” – te ami means “hand-knit” or “hand-crocheted” in Japanese – and posted a few pairs of fingerless gloves I made.

(OMG the quality of photos were so BAD 😂 a humble beginning…)

The very first day, a super sweet customer in Nashville, Tennessee, purchased a pair and turned around and placed another order right away because her daughter loved them too and wanted a pair.

It was so rewarding to be appreciated for what I made with my own two hands.

I caught the bug and kept making more gloves and other crocheted accessories to sell.

Over the last 8 years, I’d moved on from making/selling crocheted wares because I got sick of making the same things over and over, and how could you price them for the time it takes really? (anybody wants $150 pair of fingerless gloves?? 😀 maybe with the right kind of positioning and marketing, but I didn’t know that stuff back then.)

I was getting more into drawing then and was getting the same kind of appreciation for it.

And people started asking me if they could pay me to draw or design something for them.

The light bulb went on again 💡

Drawing and selling cards and prints were much more in line with how I wanted to do business, so I slowly transitioned from selling crocheted stuff and adding more art in the shop.

I changed the name of the shop to “Honeyberry Studios” in 2013.

And, mind you, I was never a hot seller on Etsy – between 2010 and until I quit my day job in July 2015, maybe I sold a thing or two per month.

It only started to pick up after I quit my job and started to devote more time making and promoting my work.

But still, Etsy has never brought me enough sales consistently.

I feel it’s hit and miss, and there is the sense of “pay to play” (in fact, they raised their seller fee a couple of months ago) and you need to be on top of your SEO game etc., which I just don’t have the time and energy for.

I was originally going to build a separate shop just for my wholesale business – because Etsy decided to close their wholesale shops at the end of July this year.

I have a bunch of friends who do really well on Etsy, and I’m happy for them!!

But I don’t like the feeling of not being in control of my shop, and it’s just not working for me.

It was time for me to move on and have my own shop that’s under Honeyberry Studios’ name.

I started working on building my new shop back in May when they first announced the closure of Etsy Wholesale.

I then decided to combine both retail and wholesale shops in one place per Shopify’s advice (that’s who’s hosting my new shop now.)

I thought – oh, I’ll take a couple of weeks to finish bulk of the website. It’ll be done by the beginning of summer.

I’m not building it from scratch (thank you Shopify!) so how hard could it be? It’s basically just copy and paste, no?

WRONG.

I always tell myself everything takes 3x longer than you think. In this case, it took me almost 5 times longer 😅

There have been learning curves and bumps on the road, BUT the important thing is…

(I’ve been manually refunding shoppers on Etsy who forgot to use the coupon code. So it saves me time, too 😀)

I love how easy it is to create/select categories, too. Etsy only allowed a limited number of categories (I think), so it’s a big bonus.

You can either start shopping by selecting a category from the “Shop” button up top, or…

Scroll to see the categories visually laid out for you!

I’m particularly happy about how you can filter all of my greeting cards by occasions, too!

On Etsy, you’d have to scroll through 80+ cards to find what you’re looking for 👎

One thing I’m a little annoyed about, thou, is that every time you put something in a cart, you’re directed to your cart and can’t just keep shopping.

If you want to keep browsing, I suggest you click on the top “Shop” button and get back in a collection you want to explore, rather than hitting the “CONTINUE SHOPPING” button at the bottom because this will throw you in “all products” page where you have to wade through 150 products all mixed together!

And may I suggest you create an account during your first visit??

Not only would you save time on your future shopping, I’m rewarding your loyalty by giving 5% off on every single order you place through your customer account!

(**NOTE:: I was hoping there was an easy way to automate this, but since I haven’t found one, I’ll be manually giving you a refund on your first order after you activate an account. Please allow 48 hours for you to see the refund. After that, it should automatically come off.)

And if you have any questions, I’ve got links to important stuff at the bottom of the website. Of course, you can always shoot me an email, too!

FYI – if you’ve already bought some of my new products at markets and are sad you didn’t get the discount – wipe your tears, friend, because I don’t charge you sales tax at markets and fairs. Plus you don’t pay for shipping, so you’re still getting a pretty good deal 😉

My old website used to make me cringe – you know, I built it from scratch using very few coding skills I had, which I’m super proud of.

It worked for what I needed in the beginning, but it felt outdated and didn’t really represent who I was and where I wanted my business to go.

My creative business is labor of love. It’s so much work but gives me so much joy in return.

I’m so happy you’re here with me, witnessing and being part of my dream!!

Take a few minutes to explore my new site today! It’s still somewhat a work in progress, so if you notice something not working, email me and I’ll take care of you!

I’m so looking forward to continue helping you find the adorable and thoughtful gifts for yourself and your loved ones ❤️

Thank you, friend!!!

xo

p.s. If you’re wondering what happens to my Etsy shop now – I’m undecided. It will be there for now, but I will be investing all of my time and energy learning and improving my new site from now on.

I received, not one, but TWO rejection emails from the holiday craft shows I applied for.

They’re kind of big, well-known shows (read: most lucrative) in the area that I really, really wanted to get into (and thought I had a good chance.)

Needless to say, I was disappointed and sad.

My emotional process looked like this 👇

1) DISBELIEF: First of all, I thought the notice wasn’t gonna be sent out till Friday?? Was this a mistake? Is this really happening?

2) FANTASY: Some of my friends didn’t make the cut either. And they’re all talented, amazing makers. Did the organizers make a mistake and send the wrong email to the wrong group of people?? I’m still waiting to get that “sorry-we-sent-the-wrong-email-and-you’re-actually-in” email.

3) CONFUSION: But people love my work! and I’ve been great to work with, haven’t I?? I’m so organized and responsive. WHY DID YOU NOT WANT ME?? 😭

4) NEGATIVE SPIRAL: Is this it for me? What if I don’t get in to ANY of the shows I applied for? Was it just a luck that my business seemed more successful this year? Is it all going to be down hill from here??

5) LOGIC: People DO love my work (and they tell me so!), and I’ve had great relationships with the organizers. It’s not personal. I have other opportunities and will most likely get into other shows.

6) ACCEPTANCE: Oh well. It is just what it is 🤷🏻‍♀️ The show must go on. What’s on my to-do list today?

I know intellectually it’s not me or that my work is bad, but it just hurts to be rejected.

(I question your humanity if this bit doesn’t make you even a little emotional…🐶)

I treated myself for a delicious brownie and pretty dahlias at the farmer’s market.

I also received a copy of Retailing Insight Magazine in the afternoon, where one of my designs was featured (along with my friend, John Met Betty‘s beautiful vegan handbags!) That helped boost my confidence for sure 😊

I don’t have a profound lesson or insight for you today.

But I just wanted to share that things aren’t always great and positive.

I’ve been noticing a trend on social media where people share hard and messy stuff in life. And even without the “things-went-to-hell-but-I’m-all-better-now” hero ending sometimes, which makes a lot of people uncomfortable.

It makes me sad to see people I admire and care about struggle, but I also appreciate their realness.

It helps me feel OK with having those ups and downs in my life, too.

Even though most of the posts on social media are curated and positive, it never tells a whole story.

So I guess what I’m trying to say is, if you’re having a hard time or feeling rejected, you’re not alone.

Nobody has it all together.

We’re enough ❤️

xo

p.s. I’m feeling a lot better after processing the feelings with friends and doing all those self-care stuff. So don’t worry!

p.p.s. I’ve got a few holiday events locked down and am waiting to hear back from a bunch more, so it’s going to be OK. I’ll let you know when I have a more solid calendar!

p.p.p.s. I’m gonna be on my 7th week mini sabbatical next week – I’ve been chipping away at my new website so I can launch it very soon. Send me good tech vibes and stay tuned 😉

“We’re working with The Greeting Card Association to promote Thinking of You Week, an international movement that encourages everyone to send a card every day for one week. We’d love it if you could help spread the message by asking your followers to send a card a day from September 24-30.”

I get requests to promote things to my followers occasionally and only follow through when the cause resonates with me and I believe it benefits you, too.

For someone who creates and sells greeting cards for a living, I don’t send out hand-written note enough!!!

When I got the postcard from Mr. Eto, I knew I wanted to send him a card and tell him what’s been going on in my life.

I wanted to tell him that I got married to a sweet loving man, I quit my job 3 years ago, and now I’m a full-time artist.

I know he’d be delighted to hear from me and would be so proud of my accomplishments 💕

The invitation to promote this challenge inspired me to join in the movement, too.

I’ll be sending a greeting card to my friends (including Mr. Eto) every day between September 24 and 30!

I already thought of a few more people I want to say hello to via a card and am getting super excited to figure out which cards to send them 😍

Do you want to tell someone that they’re on your “thinking of you” list??

We picked up our new (to us) car in Phoenix, Arizona and drove all the way through California, Oregon, and Washington over 5 days.

Here is Bruce (the car)! We drove 1500 miles including some mountains, and he did really well.

We stopped at Joshua Tree National Park – well, we didn’t plan it very well and ended up just exploring the lower part, but the landscape was out of this world. I felt like I was on the moon or mars! (I don’t know my planets very well 😬🌕)

We stopped at Redwood National Park as well. This tree had been hollowed out by the lightening and fire but the outside of it still stands tall and strong. Amazing!

We took a 90-minute tour at the Oregon Caves National Monument. Natural formation of the minerals over marble was truly breathtaking. If you go there, I highly recommend this tour!

On our last day, we visited Mt. St. Helens National Monument in Washington. It’s kind of hard to see in this picture, but the whole north side of the mountain had been blown away when the volcano erupted in 1980. We read several stories of the people who were near when the eruption happened. Many lives were lost and so many more were changed forever. So powerful.

We didn’t have whole a lot of time on this trip as we were trying to get back home in a timely manner, but we still enjoyed our adventure very much.

I’m slowly getting back into the swing of things and am super excited to share more previews form the new collection with you today✨

(Psst, in case you missed the previous previews, you can see them here and here.)

You know I care about self-care.

I used to work with people in domestic violence situations for 14+ years and found self-care to be the most important thing in their (and service providers’ ) healing.

Winter holiday season brings cheer and joy to many of us. But it can also be stressful and bring sadness and painful memories.

If you have a friend who needs a little encouragement to take care of themselves during the holiday season, this holiday self-care card would be a perfect a reminder 💕

It feels silly sometimes that we need external permissions to do something like self-care.

But I often need a permission to do or not do something and ask Dave to tell me it’s OK, like saying no to a business opportunity or a project, and he’d just repeat back to me word by word what I said and I say “OK” 😀

Again, if someone you care about is going through a hard time or just not feeling like they’re doing “enough,” let them know they’re doing the best they can ❤️

(BTW, I’ve fallen in love with this soft pink color recently, and you will see more of it in my future collections!)

Before we move on to my next preview, I need to confess.

I was planning on creating 2019 calendars with self-care themed art and sayings, including the design above.

But creating 12 new cohesive and amazing art is no easy feat, and after considering the costs and timeline, I decided not to create a monthly wall calendar for 2019 😢

My goal is to create a stunning monthly calendar for 2020 and give myself plenty of time to do so – my apologies if you’ve gotten my previous wall calendars and have been waiting for the new one! I promise it’ll be worth the wait.

I still wanted to create a calendar that will bring you joy all year long, so I created this fun Llama Dream 2019 calendar poster instead!

Sure, the yearly calendar may seem more decorative than practical, but it’s good for keeping track of things that happen monthly (like your period, that’s what I use my annual calendar poster for), quarterly, and/or annually.

I’d like to think of it as a wall art that happens to tell you the dates.

(Plus it’s printed digitally, so the price is more affordable than my archival prints.)

I created the calendar in a simple and neutral color palette (navy and warm yellow, my fave color convo!) so it’d look great in a kid’s room or your office all year long.

You like??

My new collection will debut in the next couple of weeks, so keep an eye out for the announcement! 👀

(Are you on my email list? Sign up, because I like to spoil my subscribers when I launch new products 😉)

Have a joyful day!

xo

p.s. Oh, and if you’re in the US, have a happy Labor Day! I’ll be at Fremont Sunday Market today 9/2, 10-4 if you’re in Seattle.